The ten English distribution regions

Six companies hold the English licences. UK Power Networks runs London, the South East and Eastern England. National Grid Electricity Distribution, formerly Western Power Distribution, runs the East and West Midlands and the South West. Northern Powergrid runs the North East and Yorkshire. Electricity North West and SSEN hold the North West and Southern England respectively.

The first two digits of your MPAN tell you which one applies. Every region sets its own DUoS charges, so operators running several regions still price each separately.

The north to south gradient, and why it exists

TNUoS demand charges are zonal. They reflect the physical reality that most generation sits in the north and offshore while most demand sits in the south east, and somebody has to fund moving it.

The result is a gradient. Demand-side transmission charges are lowest in the far north and highest in the south east. A business in Northumberland and an identical one in Kent will not pay the same, and no supplier can change that.

On a half-hourly meter the charge is itemised. Below that threshold it sits inside the unit rate, which is why most smaller businesses never encounter it.

Why regional charges differ beyond transmission

Each distribution region also sets its own charges, based on what its network costs to maintain against how many customers share the burden. A dense urban region spreads costs widely. A sparse rural one does not.

That is why regions with large rural territories can carry different charges to city-dominated ones even at similar latitudes, and why comparing two sites on unit rate alone tells you less than people assume.

What this means for a multi-site English business

Quote comparison needs doing per meter rather than per portfolio. A single supplier will happily cover every site on one contract and generally should, but each meter is priced from its own region upward. A portfolio average conceals which site is carrying the cost.

City-level detail sits on the London, Manchester, Birmingham, Liverpool and Leeds pages. For sites beyond England, see Scotland and Wales.

What is the same everywhere in England

More than differs. The wholesale market is national. VAT and the Climate Change Levy are UK-wide. Every licensed supplier can supply any GB meter, so your region never restricts who will quote. Contract law, the Letter of Authority process and switching timescales are identical throughout.

And the single largest avoidable cost is the same everywhere too. Missing a renewal window puts a supply onto uncapped out-of-contract rates, which will cost more than any regional difference on this page.

Getting quotes for a England site

Your region sets the network element. Everything else on the quote is still open, and that is where the work goes. The method is the same wherever you are, so rather than repeat it here, our business electricity guide covers how prices are built and what to check line by line.

One thing specific to comparing across regions. If you are pricing several sites at once, ask for the quotes broken out per meter rather than as a portfolio average. An average hides which site is carrying the cost, and it is usually the one nobody has looked at in three years. Multi-site management covers running that properly.